Drusilla with a Million Part 42

"I understand, ma'am, and I'm willin' to stand on my reputation in the neighborhood."

"Well," as he rose to go, "Dr. Eaton'll come and talk it over with you, and we'll see. How's your wife now?"

"She is much better."

"Is she in bed?"

"Yes; she only sets up a couple of hours a day."

"Pshaw, that's too bad! Wait till I see James."

She rang the bell and James appeared.

"James, fix a basket of things to eat and send it home with Mr.

Henderson. Perhaps a change of cookin'll make her eat better. A sick person gits awful tired of the same kind of vittles."

When the man left with a new look of hope on his face Drusilla turned to Mrs. Carrington.

"Now, Mis' Carrington, them's the kind of people that need help. You ain't no idee how many men in this city have got little businesses that's jest makin' them a livin' but nothin' over for a rainy day, and when the day comes they've nothin' to fall back on. And if they could tide themselves over the bad times, whether it's sickness or bad business, they'd be all right. That's just like the truck gardener down on the Fulham Lane. Ain't you seen his place? The hail broke all his gla.s.s cases, and he couldn't buy new and he most lost his little place, and if he hadn't 'a' been helped he'd 'a' had to git out."

"Did you help him?"

Drusilla looked rather shamefaced.

"Now, don't you whisper it to a soul. I'm so feered that Mr.

Thornton'll find it out that I'm scared to hear a door slam for fear he's heard somethin' and comin' to talk to me. I didn't do nothin'

for him as he knows on, but Dr. Eaton went his security at the bank so's he could borrow, and he'll be able to pay back in a couple of years."

Mrs. Carrington laughed.

"Oh, you are a dear!" she exclaimed.

"No, that's jest what I can't make Dr. Eaton see either, that I'm selfish in it all. I like to talk to people, I like to know about 'em. I've always set outside the fence before and peeked into the ball game, now I kin set in the front row and sometimes catch a ball that comes my way. You know, Mis' Carrington, I set up nights wonderin' how I kin leave my million dollars so's it'll do some good and not be fooled away. I pester Dr. Eaton to death to find a way, and he thinks he's got some kind of a poor man's bank figgered out.

He's brought up some men and we've talked ourselves hoa.r.s.e trying to figger out a charity that ain't a charity. By the way, what is your husband?"

"He is a banker."

"Now, that's jest the thing. Bring him over some night and we'll git 'em all together and have a real talk about it all. Tell him what I'm tryin' to do. No--I'll send Dr. Eaton to talk with him. I like your husband, Mis' Carrington. A man that can hold a sick baby so tender in a pan of hot water has got heart; and what we want in this is heart as well as brains and money."

Mrs. Carrington rose to go.

"I'm glad I came to you this morning, and I'm glad you like my husband, because, Miss Doane--let me whisper it to you--I believe I do too!"

CHAPTER XV

Drusilla was called to the 'phone and a nervous, trembly-voiced Daphne spoke to her.

"May I come over, Miss Doane? I--I--want to get away from the house and talk to some one--May I come over?"

Drusilla answered quickly: "Come right along, and come to spend the day. I got to go to the home, and I'll take you with me."

Soon Daphne came up the driveway and stopped to look at two big baskets being put into the motor car, and before she could ring the bell Drusilla dressed for driving came to the door.

"Git right in, Daphne," Drusilla said, putting on her gloves. "Push that basket more to the front--there, that's right. Have you got that bundle, Joseph? Don't lose it out. Now go just as fast as you can, but don't git arrested." As she sat down by the side of Daphne she added: "I'm always in mortal fear of being arrested, 'cause I like to go fast. I don't care about the arrested part, but it'd git my name in the papers again and then your father'd make me one of his 'severity' visits, and I don't seem never to git used to them. When James tells me your father is waitin' for me it makes me feel jest like I used to when I done somethin' wrong and was called into the parlor, where I always got my scoldings, 'cause mother knew the kitchen wouldn't awe me. But"--and she chuckled--"I'm gittin' kind of used even to him, and I'm gittin' so independent there ain't no livin' with me. I even show it the way I walk. When I was ordered around by everybody, I used to sort of tiptoe around so's not to call attention to myself. Now I come down so hard on my heels I have to wear rubber ones so's not to jar my spine. But"--she looked keenly at the pale face beside her and the eyes that showed signs of recent tears--"what's the matter, dear? Have you been cryin'?"

"Oh, I'm in _such_ trouble, Miss Doane," Daphne said with a choke in her voice.

Drusilla patted her hand.

"It can't be great trouble, Daphne."

"Yes, it is, Miss Doane. No one has such trouble as I have, I'm sure."

"Hush, dear, hus.h.!.+ Wait a minute. Let me show you a letter I got last night from Barbara, and then you'll know what real trouble means."

She drew from her bag a folded piece of paper and handed it to Daphne.

"Read that," she said; and Daphne read a badly spelled, badly written scrawl, in the writing of an old woman unused to holding a pen:

DEAR DRUSILLA:

I wish you'd come and see us. Mis Abbott has took poison that she got out of the medcin closet, cause she's lost her money and can't pay her board no more and she says she'd ruther die than be charity, cause she's always looked down on charity, and bin so stuck up about her family. They got it out of her with a stumak pump and she won't die this time but she says she'll do it again cause she can't live and be charity. Won't you come and see her and perhaps you can do something with her, we can't.

BARBARA.

Daphne handed the note back to Drusilla, who put it carefully into her bag before she spoke.

"Now, do you see what real trouble is? Do you remember me tellin'

you about Mis' Abbott, whose father was a general and whose husband was some sort of official down South? Well, they're all dead and her only daughter died when she was a little girl and she hadn't nothin'

left but memories and just enough money to keep her in the home. It was in some railroad stock and now I guess it's gone too. She was awful proud, and I can see how she feels. She always looked down on me 'cause I was charity, but I don't hold it agin her. She's had her arms full of sorrow and now they're too old to carry more."

"Poor woman!" said Daphne softly. "What are you going to do?"

"I ain't got it all figgered out yet. I talked it over with John till late last night, and then afterward it come to me. I guess I can do somethin'. The main thing is to make her want to live, make her think some one wants her. You know, Daphne, that's the great sorrow of the old; to feel that they ain't needed no more; that every one can git along just as well if not a little better without 'em than with 'em. When they see that, they want to die."

"Oh, I'm sorry I said anything about my troubles--they are so little! Yet they seemed so big last night--and this morning--this morning--"

"Well, what happened this mornin'? Tell me, dear; it'll make you feel better and then you'll see they ain't so very bad after all."

"This morning Mother talked to me, and Father was nasty to me at the breakfast table and--" and again the pretty eyes filled with tears.

"Who is it about this time?"

"There's no _this time;_ it's always the same. It's--it's--Dr.

Eaton."